Donald Sterling and some guys tweeting at PK Subban have brought racism in sports to the forefront of the public consciousness this week, and while I do not condone it, the public shaming of either Boston Bruins fans or Donald Sterling is ridiculous and hypocritical.
Don’t get me wrong: this is not me defending those guys. Rather, this is me asking the public to actually think about the things they choose to criticize. I know ripping on strangers who have committed atrocious verbal acts of ignorance makes you feel better, but perhaps this is a perfect time to ask why. Why does taking five seconds out of your day to condemn an idiot with the safety of knowing you’re going along with the mob make you feel so good?
Twitter and the internet in general has created a giant pulpit from which the sanctimonious majority can shame anyone they deem has broken the tacit agreement to be politically correct at all times. This wouldn’t be a problem if it less overt instances of racism, intolerance, greed and neglect were not routinely ignored.
Of course a racist 80 year old billionaire is offensive.
Of course it’s offensive to tweet racially inappropriate things at one of the only black players in the NHL. But it is also racist to think the first black President might not be a citizen of the country he leads. Nearly every thing Donald Trump or Sheldon Adelson do can in some way be interpreted as racist. And whether intentional or not, the results of what we do to help the poor, to fight crime, to fight the war on drugs etc. etc. etc. are racist.
Donald Sterling has a history of racist actions. Yet, the only time anyone cares is when he says something racist. Interesting since I grew up, as I am sure we all did, with the “actions speak louder than words” cliche bandied about daily. We teach our kids this without thinking, but in practice, actions don’t mean anything and we only care about words.
If you don’t believe me, just read the stories dominating the news right now. Are any of them about child poverty, homelessness, food banks or incarceration rates?
It’s a documented fact that minorities live in poverty and go to jail at a rate that far exceeds the percentage that they make up of the general population. This also holds true with poverty and addiction.
These are problems that might not be caused by hate, but the results are the same as if they were. They are problems that are inherently racist: whether they created by ignorance, stupidity, hate or laziness is not for me to say, but it seems obvious that something is causing this, because the only alternative is that white people just work hard and obey the law better than any other race, and that is a flat-out ridiculous notion.
To focus so heavily on what amounts to sad, hurtful, but ultimately innocuous comments is hypocritical at best. At worst it’s an over reaction to something minor based on our collective guilt about things we think are perhaps too big to fix. There are other problems in society related to race that we just completely ignore. Sure, it’s fun to collectively gang up on a racist 80-year-old billionaire, because let’s face it, no one is less deserving of your sympathy. In doing so, however, we ignore the fact that across North America the rates of child poverty are estimated to be as high as 20%. That means one in five kids currently alive and living somewhere close to you are unlikely to eat three meals today. Most of them eat once and then do not know where or when their next meal will come from.
I’d also be willing to bet that the vast majority of white, 80-year-old billionaires are racist. And even if they aren’t, unless they actively give away most of their money, their actions contribute — and this is a scientific fact — to problems that very much affect minorities in a disproportionate way.
But Brutus is an honourable man and Donald Sterling is the devil.
So my question is: Why do we think that Donald Sterling is such a terrible person when we collectively allow children to starve? When we send minorities to prison at a rate that surely must constitute a human rights violation? The guy is a dirt bag, but the fact that he doesn’t share his wealth and is allowed to hoard billions of dollars in resources is far more of a real problem than the fact that he is racist and apparently doesn’t understand irony.
What about the charities that sanctimoniously refused to take the money of this racist? They have literally hurt more people by doing so than his comments ever did. I mean, sticks and stones and all that, right?
So please don’t take this as a defense of people who are obviously indefensible. All I am saying is that we face a lot of racism in our society on a day-to-day basis. If anyone needs shaming, it’s not a guy who’s so old he is never going to change his ways, it’s us because we call out people for things that, in the big picture, do not matter; while we ignore real, actual problems.
We deserve shame for allowing as many as 20% of the kids in our country to starve while we fret over nothing.
We deserve shame for only caring about the racist things people say, and not the things they do.
That is all.
Covering the Leafs for the Hockey Writers.
